I was disappointed. [11], Spanfeller ran Forbes.com for 8 years from 2001 to 2009, when digital and print operations were run separately. Jim Spanfeller (@JimSpanfeller) / Twitter According to Great Hill Partners website, Spanfeller has led comparable media platforms and positioned them for successful strategic exit, which probably means something to someone, somewhere, but Spanfeller is perhaps best known for dramatically increasing Forbes.coms focus on digital advertising (Spanfeller also previously served as chairman of the Interactive Advertising Bureau). That is clearly evident when you note the poor syntax and galling bias of the questions. As for why that move was never announced, Spanfeller told Deadspin he believed Mike McAvoy would announce Rogers arrival, even though Spanfeller hired Rogers and he has announced other hires across the company since taking over. I realized that I wasnt communicating my advocacy for the department or our initiatives to upper management and other departments back to the team clearly enough. I thought she was going to be great, and it didnt work out by her own assessment., In response to follow-up questions, Spanfeller clarified that there was never a signed offer between Pontius and the company. The four women who Spanfeller counts as major hires include two he hired (head of talent and deputy counsel); one he promoted from within to executive managing editor; and a yet-to-be-filled position he says he plans to offer to a woman. Vacillating Wildly From Dispiriting to Exhilarating. Indeed, two former G/O Media staffers blasted Spanfeller for being stingy with resources. "[17], "Great Hill Partners Agrees to Acquire Gizmodo Media Group", "Great Hill Partners Acquires Gizmodo Media Group", "President & CEO, Jim Spanfeller Named as IAB Chairman", "Alumni Album: Helping Us Connect to the Web", "Advertising; 4 Young Executives On Move at Newsweek", "Playboy Hires 2 New Execs; Title of Publisher Goes to 1", "New Gizmodo boss Jim Spanfeller is an old school digital media vet", "After Days Of Resignations, The Last Of The Deadspin Staff Has Quit", "Deadspin Is ZombifiedBut Gawker's Content Warriors Fight On", "The Media-Sensational Rise and Fall of "Jim Spanfeller Is a Herb", "GMG Union votes no confidence in G/O Media CEO Jim Spanfeller", https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Jim_Spanfeller&oldid=1074755870, This page was last edited on 2 March 2022, at 00:52. In all of those cases Jim listened to my arguments and in many cases agreed with me and the issue was settled, he wrote in response to one question. Meanwhile, many people who are still at the company feel their work is being hindered by new management. A spokesperson for G/O has yet to respond to a request for clarification, but we will update this post if and when that changes. During Jim Spanfeller's younger years, he lived in Pennsylvania and recieved his Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in 1952 from the Philladelphia Academy of the Fine Arts. A source said Spanfeller told editors-in-chief of the companys websites that he had chosen Maidment, 68, for the job before the sale was completed and did not interview other candidates, including Banikarim. (Pontius left the company.) Spanfeller Media is working to redefine content for the digital era. Political affiliation Definition | Law Insider Political affiliation. Jim Spanfeller Biography & Works of Art | Qart.com Sources say that on the tech side of the company, Spanfeller has taken to micromanaging various aspects of developers work, holding meetings to ask what each one is working on, demanding detailed accounts of how they spend their working days, and mandating various projects based on his work at Forbes in the mid-2000s. Multiple people who worked for him at The Daily Meal (part of Spanfeller Media Group) told Deadspin that Spanfeller couldnt cede any control. That distinction quickly sparked backlash in late 2019, when the staff of Deadspin resigned over the firing of a top editor and the company's mandate that the site stick to covering sports. Answering a similar one, he seemed to contradict himself: This concern was expressed to me and I take it very seriously. [2], In 2019, G/O Media's sports blog Deadspin received media attention when all of its writers and editors resigned after an edict given by upper management to "stick to sports". Reverse Phone Search Tool And much more all for free! G/O Media shuttered its politics site, Splinter, in 2019. I found this troubling but was okay with it given the circumstances. Find Out With This Weeks News Quiz. The next day she refused to join me in communicating our plans to Susie. (check all that apply); and What do you like LEAST about Deadspin? Vice president of sales for the south Lance Johnson, who worked with Spanfeller at Forbes (and most recently worked with Bruce Rogers at a company called SITO Mobile). "The fact that we could acquire it at a price that would make it one of our smallest investments is that good or bad? Why Ketanji Brown Jackson Split With the Courts Liberals in a 54 Decision, the firing of beloved editor Barry Petchesky, According to Great Hill Partners website, increasingly insisted on directing editorial coverage. Editorial director Paul Maidment, who worked with Spanfeller at Forbes and The Daily Meal. Two are now successfully navigating careers in the digital advertising space. He would stop into peoples offices with the doors open and scream at them, so everyone knew what was going on., 5. In addition to the annoying ads, G/O Media CEO Jim Spanfeller also wants Kotaku to only write about video games. The appropriate thing to do would be to talk to the editorial side of the business and have a clear objective for the survey.. Im shocked he would call that a good presentation, said the employee who was in the meeting. James J. Spanfeller Jr. is an American media executive best known for running Forbes.com from 2001-2009. At the same time, working with the EICs to set a general editorial direction is clearly in the purview of any owner.). Computing. Vice president for west coast sales Steve Thompson, who worked with Spanfeller at, Vice president for east coast sales Sean Flanagan, who worked with Spanfeller at. Spanfeller accused writers and editors of acting in bad faith based on a list of questions submitted to him before publication and the fact that a draft of the article had been sent for legal. Who even told you you were allowed to think about audience?, My management was straight-up scared of him, said a staffer who worked at the site for two years and had responsibilities on both the editorial and marketing sides of the company. Maidment never responded to my questions directly; the first time I saw his answers was when they were included in Spanfellers company-wide email, but he had this to say about his role in the newsroom: I have always shielded the editorial teams I have managed from commercial or business-side interference in what they write, which to my mind is the essence of editorial integrity. But those efforts did not go very far, the people said, and the company has yet to mount a takeover. I had experience and confidence in the people who were hired. This former staffer said the team wished to add Black creatives to help create more representative branded content to meet the demand, but it was not given additional resources. Sports News Without Fear, Favor or Compromise. Both lawsuits detail discrimination personally faced or witnessed by the plaintiffs from Jim Spanfeller, who became CEO of G/O Media in April after private equity firm Great Hill acquired Gizmodo Media Group. Voter Registration Records G/O Media workers went on strike today in part to protect remote work. Jim Spanfeller . Below are some of the biggest revelations outlined in Deadspins roughly 7,000 word report on their parent company and its new management, which they spoke to nearly two dozen G/O Media employees for. Jim Spanfeller - New York, New York, United States - LinkedIn He is currently the CEO of G/O Media which consists primarily of sites that were previously part of Gawker Media. Spanfeller Has an Alleged History of Screaming at Women Employees. We could have video analytics today. "We have billions of dollars available to go out and buy and make this a bigger company, and that would really be our desire," Gaffney said. As you know, one reason that I dont believe that publications should write about themselves is because I fear it damages perceived external credibility in editorial independence, which, if anything, makes keeping advertisers at bay harder, not easier. A longtime digital media veteran, Spanfeller was an unconventional choice to lead the new Gizmodo Media Group sites (The Daily Beast's CEO, Heather Dietrick, once served as president of the . It is also worth noting that multiple internal candidates have expressed interest in the position of EIC of the A/V Club. The Onion union declined to comment, but a source with knowledge of the situation disputed that the union demanded promotions, saying its letter demanded action and used the words We ask for the following when addressing promotions. (The people I work for and the people who report to me know what I do, Rogers, 63, told Deadspin in an email.). When Jim Spanfeller and a private equity firm called Great Hill Partners took over G/O Mediaformerly Gizmodo Media Groupin April, their stated goal was to make the company profitable. James J. Spanfeller Jr. is an American media executive best known for running Forbes.com from 20012009. The mess at G/O Media - Columbia Journalism Review Jim Rich, the former Daily News editor charged with bringing Deadspin back to life following a mass staff exodus, has resigned after just 18 months on the job, The Post has learned. On July 30, the day after I emailed reporting questions to Spanfeller, Maidment, Rogers, Jesse Knight, and Sean Flanagan, Spanfeller sent a company-wide email under the subject line Reporting on Ourselves; Deadspin Reporting On The Company and Our Executives. In the email, excerpts of which were published by media reporters from the Wall Street Journal and Washington Post, Spanfeller voiced his opinion on how coverage of the company should work: I believe the solution is to have that reporting reviewed by an impartial outside editor a Public Editor, if you will [] and not just for these situations but for any situation where someone within or without the company has issues with our coverage or reporting. Spanfeller Hired Media Friends/Former Colleagues to Fill G/O Media Roles Just After Claiming He Had No Plans for Major Turnover. G/O Media CEO Jim Spanfeller says the company is profitable and ready ), The internal reaction to these hires has ranged from confusion to anger. [1] During those meetings, Maidments ideaswhich included commissioning an editor outside the company to review and approve stories written by about the companywere met with unanimous opposition. The person hired was Bruce Rogers, who most recently ran the institute arm of SITO Mobile, a mobile data company. In an email read to Deadspin, McAvoy agreed that she was qualified for the role and said he would talk with Spanfeller to ensure she was interviewed for the new opportunity, which had not been posted publicly. Former Daily News Editor in Chief Is Tapped to Run Deadspin [12][13], In 2011, Spanfeller launched The Daily Meal with an estimated $2 million investment. This Is How Things Work Now At G/O Media - Deadspin Spanfeller Media Group - Wikipedia He started screaming at me, Who told you you were allowed to speak about audience? These conversations reveal that Spanfellers biggest effect on the company since taking over has been a deflation of morale. Jim characterized that as a misunderstanding, she said. Former CEO of http://Forbes.com, Chairman Emeritus, IAB, Sec OPA NYCJoined April 2009 266Following 1,878Followers Tweets Tweets & replies Media Likes Jim Spanfeller's Tweets Jim Spanfeller @JimSpanfeller Mar 13, 2020 Good News! 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So Out of Touch: Gen Z Congressman-Elect Mocks RNC Tweet Criticizing Him For His Housing Woes. Have a tip or story idea? The anger stems from Spanfellers apparent disregard for his own stated company values, which include a commitment to diversity and inclusion. Views. During an internal sales summit meeting in New York on June 19, sales execs practiced pitching G/O Medias general presentation, a deck of about 15 slides that tells clients why they should do business with the company. The private equity firm was able to snap up the deal for only about $25 million, according to a person with direct knowledge of the figure. . "We remain optimistic that our labor will be taken into consideration as this period of financial promise collides with a time that has been particularly rough on morale," the Onion Union statement said. These actions are clearly management attempting to target, and even intimidate, staff into changing their editorial stance in spite of our contract-protected independence, especially as it comes on the heels of managements repeated attempts to kill this story as it was being reported about the company. Now that we are closer to stabilizing the company, there can be a more deliberate recruitment and hiring process. Sign up for notifications from Insider! Jim Rich, the former top editor of the New York Daily News, will start as editor-in-chief of Deadspin on Monday. Emma Carmichael is a friend of mine, and we both worked at Gawker Media and, as it was later named after being purchased by Univision, Gizmodo Media Group, or GMG. I hired Katie who accepted the job, he wrote. (The other woman on the executive leadership team, general counsel Lynn Oberlander, left the company this week.) Im not building a club, we are working to build a successful companyand that depends on great women and men.. DIVERSITY AND INCLUSION are core to our culture, and we expect all staff to advance and promote that. Heartened, the SVP emailed Spanfeller to remind him of their meeting in April and express her hope that women, people of color, and people who identify as LGBTQ would be considered as he hired his leadership team, and to say that she looked forward to discussing her role in the organization. "We closed Splinter because it was a liberal political site that was losing audience in the middle of a liberal moment," he said. To hear G/O Media CEO Jim Spanfeller tell it, everything at his digital media company is going great. He did not answer a question about whether he was aware that a female VP was already leading west coast sales or that he installed a man (who also carries a VP title) above her. In April, the tech team was told to move the companys video operations off of MCP, which Univision paid for to host video content, and onto JW Player, a cheaper video system. Before we go any further, I feel compelled to acknowledge that nearly everything about this item is a conflict of interest. Political party affiliation trends based on location. It has introduced real uncertainty in to stocks, and Trump's agenda has become shaky. The post, published Tuesday evening, proved wildly popular on Twitter. You wrote a 'story,'" Spanfeller recalled telling staff. Views. Who even told you you were allowed to think about audience? the woman alleged. Jim Spanfeller, Email him here: caleb@mediaite.com I had experience and confidence in the people who were hired. The sales employee (who is not an SVP) wasnt surprised to hear that Spanfeller didnt know what she did. Ultimately, the issue of building a wall has raised political risk, Cramer said. Jim Spanfeller Biography. Never mind the flood of negative stories about staff blowback over the company's editorial direction. (Pontius declined to comment. He is currently the CEO of G/O Media which consists primarily of sites that were previously part of Gawker Media. Announcing Persauds hire on July 10, Spanfeller wrote this of the process: After a very fulsome search where we interviewed dozens of qualified candidates we identified two finalists. 12-Year-Old Prankster Throws Dead Snake on Woman's Car and Gets Flattened by Husband 15,743. He sits on the Board of Directors of The New York Chapter of The National Foundation for Teaching . Jim Spanfeller @JimSpanfeller Founder of http://TheDailyMeal.comand http://TheActiveTimes.com. Jim Spanfeller - Chief Executive Officer @ G/O Media - Crunchbase My territory has been cut in half. In addition to poor planning and communication around the video player, multiple sources say Spanfeller wouldnt allow the tech team to implement video tracking analytics on JW Player, so no one had any idea how many views videos were getting. The company is also on the hunt for acquisitions, according to Spanfeller. Takeaways From Deadspin's Expos of G/O Media CEO Jim Spanfeller View Jim Spanfeller's professional profile on LinkedIn. They include: (Spanfeller declined to be interviewed in person but answered emailed questions. In conversations with Deadspin, more than 20 employees from across the business, tech, and editorial departments of G/O Media expressed frustration with Spanfellers approach to hiring and his new executives lack of knowledge about the company combined with their seeming unwillingness or inability to get up to speed. G/O Media Workers Call on Owners to Replace CEO - WSJ Traffic has fallen across G/O Media's portfolio over the past two years, which Spanfeller pinned on industry-wide struggles to generate audience plus the loss of Deadspin and Splinter. In its brief life, the postwritten by Emma Carmichael, a former editor at a former version of the companywas viewed nearly 100,000 times and was tweeted out by the official People for Bernie Twitter account. [9], In 1996, Spanfeller left his job at Inc., where he had become publisher, to become publisher of Yahoo! 1. Shortly after the sale in April, she said, she met briefly with Spanfeller and explained to him her role and responsibilities in the company, which was primarily to work directly with clients to secure partnerships, instead of going through media ad agencies. Employees across editorial, sales, and tech have left, but many of these positions, even mission-critical ones, have not been filled. Two are now successfully navigating careers in the digital advertising space. I have stood up for and advocated for my team since the day I started at G/O. It became clear that she was not a good fit for this position and we both agreed on this. And as the only woman on the previous revenue leadership team, I started to wonder if women were being considered for leadership roles. Indeed, Spanfeller told Deadspin that he first contacted Rogers about the job on June 11. Ad revenue rebounded, Spanfeller told Insider last year. At least have everybody well briefed on this is what were doing and this is what wed like to learn from it, Reibstein said. Voting precincts and districts. Great Hill Partners did not disclose the financial terms of the private, all equity transaction but stated in a press release that Spanfeller is an investor. Page 1 of 9,554,641. Stay up to date with what you want to know. Club executive editor Laura M. Browning and former A.V. And he made sure to make it clear that I just didnt get it in his mind that I just didnt get this whole digital thing, she said. "From the outset, CEO Jim Spanfeller has worked to undermine a successful site by curtailing its most well-read coverage because it makes him personally uncomfortable," the Gizmodo Media Group . And Fake. Jim Spanfeller Analyzes Public Policy - Big Think In the email, Spanfeller said he was "greatly concerned about the objectivity and core intentions of this piece," and questioned the editorial standards of Deadspin's editors. McAvoy told her she would be able to interview for a bigger role, she said, only to follow up a few weeks later and say that Rogers had been hired. Sole dedication to revenue, getting it the cheapest, quickest way possible. Mike hired Steve, and Steve hired Lance after conducting a process around each hire. Great Hill Partners vice president Eric Ahlgren and managing partner Chris Gaffney did not respond to Deadspins emailed questions. According to his LinkedIn, Thompson is the founder of Mediacentric Inc., a multi-media representation company., A man was hired with my same title [vice president for west coast sales] to be my boss, the VP told Deadspin. In 1964, Spanfeller recieved the title of Artist of the Year from the Artists Guild of New York. Jim Justice speaks during President Donald Trump's political rally inside the Big Sandy Superstore Arena in Huntington on Thursday. The job, however, came with a condition, they said: Pontiuss first order of business would be to fire newsroom editorial director Susie Banikarim. In the midst of the fallout, former Deadspin, Gawker, and Jezebel editor Emma Carmichael had a spirited discussion with [former Jezebel writer] Clio Chang on the overwhelming herbishness of Jim Spanfeller, she told me over the phone. Jim Spanfeller - Wikipedia That evening, the woman received an email from McAvoy telling her that the SVP of marketing job had been filled with someone who worked with Spanfeller at Forbes. About their hires, he wrote, I introduced Steve and Lance to Mike McAvoy, but I did not make the hires. All rights reserved. As the former publisher of National Geographic, Mens Health & Maximmy successful presentation & leadership skills are evident.. In a follow-up meeting with Spanfeller about the story, she suggested that hard financial data might not be their audiences central interest. A week after Spanfeller insisted to Variety that he did "not plan to cut our way to growth," the CEO fired 25 employees, including in top positions, such as axing former Gizmodo Media Group. It was placed there without consultation or even simple communication to anyone on Deadspins staff. If I had known, I would have been happy to interview her and consider her for the role., On June 20, the next time Spanfeller was in Chicago, the SVP met with him to ask why she had been overlooked. When she tried to edit the post, she was greeted by the following image: Attempts to create a new post were similarly thwarted. The two former staffers described Spanfeller as a micromanager who insists on approving minor budget items and sitting in on meetings far beneath his level, like editorial audience meetings with. Have a tip we should know? Just two weeks after Spanfeller and Great Hill acquired the company, and less than a week after he said in an interview with Variety that he didnt expect any layoffs, Spanfeller fired 25 people across the 400-person company, including Susie Banikarim, GMGs widely respected editorial director, and the only person of color on the executive leadership team at the time. The takeover of G/O Media, previosuly known as Gizmodo Media Group and Gawker Media, by former Forbes executive Jim Spanfellercontinues to throttle downhill, as one of the companys news sites, Deadspin, published a scathing expos on Friday detailing a litany of problems employees have faced since investment firm Great Hill purchased Gizmodo and placed Spanfeller in control. "We were a leftist site, not a liberal one, which gives you a sense of how closely Spanfeller followed our work," he said. The SVP shared her teams revenue goals and their success in meeting those goals, staying focused on numbers and her teams value because she knew her work would be key to profit margins. Im sorry that Mike didnt more clearly convey the information to me., McAvoy said, Jim has a different recollection of the facts., The SVP said she told Spanfeller that she wasnt the only person who noticed this pattern of hiring his former colleagues over women at the company, and that he should be prepared to address it. WV Gov. Justice switching political parties, returning to GOP These two highly talented HR executives then met with a number of people around our company including representatives of the unions., When asked why Spanfeller didnt follow this thorough search process before filling seven key positions with his former coworkers, he blamed his hiring practices on the financial shape of the company. One theory was that Spanfeller thought implementing analytics would take developer resources away from building the new video platform and player, though employees said implementing analytics is a relatively easy fix. G/O Media, owner of Gizmodo and The Onion, will post an eight-figure operating profit this year, CEO Jim Spanfeller says. Follow him on Twitter here: @calebecarma. The JW Player was an interim step, Spanfeller said.

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